


And by Your Hand am I Remade

by Zinfandel



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Anger Management, Body Modification, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Miscommunication, Newt Means Well, Past Child Abuse, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Scars, and does well, credence gains confidence, sort of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-17
Updated: 2017-02-17
Packaged: 2018-09-25 01:56:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9797375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zinfandel/pseuds/Zinfandel
Summary: Anon tumblr prompt: Crewt, scarmapping, body worship, body positivity.Credence adapts to all things, just slowly. But now..why is Newt going around half naked? and why is Credence doing it too? There is no propriety in this magic suitcase is there. But Newt misunderstands Credence's modesty, even if he means well, but he makes up for his assumption by offering Credence the greatest gift of his life.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Well. Here we are again with a prompt that i barely followed. oh well. It's still a lot of body positivity, but in the bodily autonomy sense. Credence gets what he needs, but he has to deal with shenanigans to get there eyy
> 
> Thank you luna for your immense amounts of sense, and thank you mac & Coral that multipurposetooldude and Ben for listening to me bitch :'D youz dabess

It took a while, like most things for Credence these days. And accepting this fact about himself took a while, too. Regardless, things were so...intense for the first few months of his stay with Newt Scamander that he didn’t have much space to worry after anything that wasn’t in his immediate attention. 

Magic was overwhelming, the suitcase overwhelming, leaving New york? Overwhelming. 

Credence spent those first weeks mostly holed up in the room Mr. Scamander made out of magic for him, venturing out into the workshop or suitcase proper once a day to force himself into acceptance. 

He figured that immersing himself in all of the strangeness and sorcery would eventually adapt him to it, but it was a hard thing to do for a while. Even petting a mooncalf left him under a blanket of numbing disbelief, their leathery skin and bristly fur so utterly foreign, the way they twisted their long necks to watch him with unblinking eyes unnerving. They were the most gracious of creatures within the case as well, so familiarizing himself with the animals was still an ongoing process.

It frustrated him that he couldn’t be like Newt. Just shrugging off the strangeness, just accepting what was and moving on. He tried, was still trying to achieve this state of being, but Credence had little hope of finding it.

Still, It was a few months and he was regularly feeding mooncalves and graphorns and watching the bizarre beasts live, breathe, and function without a care that they were magic and fantastic. 

It had also been a few months in which Credence devoured every book he could get his hands on, every explanation and lesson Newt trotted off into without warning, and observed as much as he could, trying not to even blink to absorb this new world, this new life. It was utterly fascinating once he tempered how terrifying it all initially was. 

With Newt by his side and at his back the horrors of magic seemed far off, the dangers of the creatures just distant stories. 

Slowly and inevitably, Credence did grow accustomed to it all, to Newt, and to his creatures. It was no longer a flood of overwhelming newness, but more of a steady stream of gradual understanding, and he could cope with that. He could handle and familiarize it. Now, some things even seemed mundane, like the vegetables in the cold frames and Dougal’s gentle anticipations. 

Now, Credence’s mind opened up to new worries as the immediacy of survival was no longer all encompassing. A concept, he had to admit, that was quite foreign to him. Surviving was all he knew his whole life, but here in the suitcase making it to tomorrow was inevitable and inescapable. It was comforting, this stability, and in it he let his perception expand.

For now though, Credence shed his jacket and waistcoat and rolled up his shirt sleeves to start work on redesigning the Arizonian habitat into a cold north-canadian temperate forest to hopefully house the Re’em Newt has been getting rumors about in Chicago. 

As Credence worked to shovel dirt and haul stone, delicately directing what he couldn’t lift with Newt’s wand, he let himself marvel at how much he’d changed. How happily he picked up work for Newt whereas it was so hard to force himself to do anything before. 

Newt was out for a bit, trusting Credence to not destroy too much, and it left Credence with a sort of fearful confidence. 

He was breaking down Frank’s rock formations in to gravel to haul to the sides for Newt to transfigure later. The weather patterns in the enclosure were already shifting to cooler winds as the Arizonian influence was destroyed but Credence was still sweating with the effort of controlling magic and the physical labor he prefered when he knew he could use the wand no longer. 

His magic was volatile and didn’t much like to be forced through a wand, but if he didn’t use the instrument as a sort of funnel, the entire enclosure would probably crumble. The obscurus was always simmering just below his skin, wanting to push more magic through the small openings Credence allowed it, So Credence made due, using the simple spells he knew to break and destroy (those came easiest to him) and then moved the rubble by hand with a shovel and wheelbarrow. 

It was amid hauling stone back and forth that Credence’s sleeve caught on the wheelbarrow handle and ripped open at the cuff, tearing up to his elbow. He was sweating and exhausted and knew for a fact he could not concentrate to repair the damned thing, so Credence set the barrow down and shed his shirt entirely.

This was another changed thing, he thought as he looked at the stained and damp cloth in his hands. He would never have previously removed his clothing to persist in working. He never really had a need to strip down for hard labor in his life at the church, though he saw many a dockman and factory worker walking home in the hot summer evenings with their shirts slung over their shoulders, their underclothes tied around their waists and their broad chests and thick arms copper from the sun. 

A man of the lord such as he was had no use for sweating and Ma forbade such indecency by course. He was the only grown male in the house regardless so the impropriety of baring his naked skin would have been...well, he never found out what would have happened if he did. Ma was very strict about purity of mind and body. He was never allowed. 

And then? Then to top the sour subject his thoughts fell to, Credence remembered the times he was bare. Naked for his sins to receive his discipline and repent. 

His shirt was off now, ripped and soiled and his skin was on display, just like back then. The scars for his sins suddenly felt alive on him, crawling across his back and shoulders, biting and stinging up his palms and arms. Even the ones still covered seemed to react to his treason, his indecency, shrieking at him with gouging pinprick fingers that he dare disregard their reminder. 

It curled hot anger within him that he was so weak, so very weak to let these long healed crimes still hold sway over him. And the next thing he knew, a loud sound of ripping fabric interrupted the black hatred that started eating him. 

His shirt lay in two halves in his palms. He had torn it complete in twain. 

The shock of it, of him utterly destroying his clothes tempered the boiling anger within him as he stared dumbly at the simple ruin. He did it so thoughtlessly, such sudden violence. He forgot sometimes how strong the obscurus was.  _ He _ was. It manifested power in many different and distressing ways, and losing himself as almost did was...unacceptable.

Still, Credence held the shirt in his hands, examining the shredded line of the tear. He couldn’t put it back on even if he wanted to now, and it occurred to him that soiling another shirt as he moved rock was completely hare-brained. 

Credence huffed out a raw, mirthless bark of laughter and threw the pieces of his shirt to the side. He was being ridiculous. 

His ma couldn’t hurt him ever again. He murdered her when she tried.

But his exposed skin still reminded him of her, the tightness across his back as he moved and pulled at the scars that gouged into his flesh a constant screaming alert of his past, of her words and her teachings, of all the things wrong and bad in the world and in himself. He was slow to rid himself of these thoughts, just like he was slow in everything else, but still, they came less frequently and wounded him less painfully.

Credence breathed through the spoiling tar squirming up under his skin and kept working, repeating to himself that if he had grown receptive and appreciative towards magic, then he could also banish all reminders of his past. 

Somehow. 

…

Newt arrived back in the case an hour or so later. Credence was still hauling rock to one wall and smoothing out the soil barechested and dirty as Newt approached the raised biome. 

He was noisy enough stepping up the creaky stairs and Credence slowly lowered his shovel as he faced him, quite unsure what to do with himself. He was shirtless, his skin starting to already burn under the artificial sun, and every single scar across his upper body was very very noticeable. 

Credence watched as Newt’s eyes took in the sight of him for a brief moment then skittered off to look around at the half disassembled biome. 

“You’ve been hard at work,” Newt stated simply as he walked past Credence and over a short ways to the poorly patched canvas backdrop. 

Credence followed him and then dug out Newt’s wand from his back pocket when the man held his hand out for it. 

Wordlessly,  Newt conducted his wand and the hole in the canvas began to seal itself up, each torn thread reattaching itself (Credence would have to ask Newt to repair his shirt later just the same). Then, Newt started to walk the perimeter and patch up other easily fixed defects. He spoke as he worked and Credence watched him for a moment where he stood.

“I didn’t dare go into any of the speakeasy’s I cased out the other day today, not without my wand, but i did do some shopping for us. Groceries, feed for the animals, potion ingredients and the like. The Bewitched Boulevards of Chicago are really something, Credence, you must accompany me to them sometime. Still, I picked up a whole variety of seeds for us to start the forest, and I did happen to overhear at the livestock exchange on the edge of town some very promising information for our hunt.” He rattled off as he worked, and once the canvas walls were all repaired Newt moved onto the soil and began shifting that into something more level in the middle and hilled on the edges. The flatness would aid when they reinstated the expansion charms, or so Credence was told.

“You’ve made good progress today, I can already tell the weather is being indecisive without a lead on what it should do. Tomorrow I’ll need my wand and you can start planting the seeds. I’ll just finish up with the rock outcroppings for den walls here, you can go wash up if you’d like. You seem like you could use it,” Newt rambled on, his back to Credence as he turned towards the piles of rubble Credence moved out of the way. 

Credence nodded and shuffled off to clean himself, not quite sure if he was happy Newt never acknowledged his nudity or disappointed in himself for anticipating a reaction and not receiving one.  

…

The next day, after breakfast for all and sundry, Newt left Credence to plant the seeds for the forest and grasslands that the Re’em would inhabit.

It wasn’t hard labor like yesterday’s tasks, but Credence still stripped down to just his shirtsleeves and trousers, rolling up his sleeves and cuffs. He tied his hair back too, since he would be bent double most of the day and it was getting long enough now to get in his way. 

Frankly, he thought he looked ridiculous as he gathered up his spade and seeds, but this was how Newt dressed most often for work, and no one was here to see him tromp barefoot through the fresh turned soil, so he got to work.

It was hours later when the task was done and Credence stood surveying what he accomplished. Newt would be the one to sprout the plants with magic, but the manual work needed to be done first. Credence felt a soothing sense of accomplishment at the scene, the grass seed spread evenly and the tree and flower seeds scattered as naturally as Credence could imagine they should be.

He was covered head to toe in mud and dirt, his feet nearly black with it, and clumps clinging into his leg hair; his fingernails caked with mud, his forearms smeared. He knew he had it in his hair too, streaked across his cheeks and lines of dust in the creases of his skin where sweat stuck the grit to him. 

He felt disgusting.

And strangely open. 

He decided while he was so dirty and in such a good mood, he would tend to some of the more...hands on tasks before Newt was done with his business for the day. There were still a few hours before he said he’d be back, and if he were chasing leads on the illegal breeders, then he could be out for quite a while.

So, Credence went first to tend to the giant Scarabs, to dismantle their current tower of dung to set aside for transfiguring, and set them on task to clean out the other inhabitants they normally didn’t get to all that often, like the floating islands of the niffler and mooncalves and the aquarium.

Dusk was falling in the suitcase another few hours later when Credence finished with the cleaning of the animal dens with the Scarab beetles and he felt thoroughly repulsive,  so caked he was in mud and other more unsanitary things. H e didn’t even want to venture into the workshop for fear of tracking it in with him.

So Credence patted the scarabs and turned them towards their new building blocks and made his way over to the springhouse on the side of the shed. 

Normally, Credence used the bath, even if it was just a large metal trough employed mostly for collecting water for their larger charges. He was more familiar to sitting down and using a sponge to bathe as that was their method to stay clean at the church, using a dry sink, but Newt didn’t keep a basin and pitcher for that purpose here so Credence used what he was instructed to. 

Being able to sit and soak in hot water was it’s own luxury, and it also preserved a bit of modesty since Newt felt no compunction, usually, to let Credence bathe in peace, instead tromping around the enclosures as he would, carrying on as if it were the most normal thing in the world, picking fruit next to a naked man trying to wash himself. It left Credence slouching down into the water every time,  attempting to retain some semblance of propriety. Newt had given him a few strange looks at the beginning about his behavior, but soon adapted to Credence’s reticence like he did all things, easily and with no fuss. 

Tonight, a bath sounded vile, so the shower it was to be. And the shower was it’s own adventure, for it was merely a sluice directed out from the roof of the springhouse to spill upon the rocks on the bank of the small perpetual stream that fed through the bamboo forest. There was no privacy to be found and it was unfortunately often that Credence accidentally came upon Newt under the shower, washing the dirt of the day from his very very naked body.

Credence was used to him by now as well, so he no longer froze up and excused himself at the sight of Newt even if he still dutifully averted his eyes, but he had never been the one to use the shower…

Newt wasn’t here though, so it would be fine. 

Credence stripped off his clothing, throwing it in a heap and opened up the sluice. He cast the simple heating spell fashioned into the wall that worked upon the falling water and waited for it to steam up from the cold rocks before stepping under it. 

And it was instantly delightful. 

The pressure of the falling water on his scalp and shoulders was unlike anything Credence had experienced before. The heat just right, and the pounding of the shower soothing out his sore, tense muscles. He stood under it for long minutes, letting the water flatten his hair, run over his face, down his front and back. It washed away some of the dirt by itself, it was so strong. Credence would definitely be doing this again. 

After an indulgent moment, Credence began to pick at his fingernails to dig the dirt out from under them and then bent down to do the same to his toes, letting the water beat upon the tightness of his back. He noticed how some of the more persistent dirt clung to the creases in the skin of his hands where scars raised and ridged his palms as well as in the whorls of his finger pads and the wrinkles of his knuckles. 

He spent some time making sure his hands were completely dirt free. 

Then, he reached over to the ledge on the springhouse that held the bathing supplies and grabbed up the barsoap and sponge to lather up and slough off the rest of the dirt on himself. It felt divine scrubbing himself clean and soon enough the water ran clear upon the rocks.

Credence grabbed up the powder shampoo next and lathered up his hair out of the shower downspout when he paused, fingers tangled into the suds of his hair. 

He looked over to where a noise froze him up and found, of all things, Newt standing just outside his workshop door stopped mid-step as if he were the one surprised.

Maybe he was. 

The unexpected company jarred Credence’s thoughts to a halt. His hands, covered in soap, gripped at his hair and he was standing bare as the day he was born mere meters from Newt who was wide eyed and almost guilty seeming as he stared.

“Ah, uh. Carry on, I was- hmmm...” Newt stammered and Credence watched his cheeks darken as he turned his head to look off and away from Credence towards the new Re’em enclosure. “I just thought, well I assumed you’d be in the bath but, uh- I’ll just...nip out and get started on the forest. Don’t stop on my account, I’ll just-” and Newt gathered himself up and stalked purposefully across the deck to the bare biome.

Credence remained stupefied as water rained on his chest, his hair growing cold in the air as he watched Newt leave. 

Newt who then tripped and fell  _ up _ the stairs.

Credence nearly choked.

Then he very well did because he snorted up some shampoo suds from the hand he used to cover his mouth. He nearly bent double with the force of his sudden coughing and hacks, and not a moment later did he hear laughter across the deck as he gasped for steamy air.

Credence looked up, tears adding to the wetness on his skin and Newt was sprawled on the steps, face buried in one hand trembling in laughter. 

Credence quickly followed between choking breaths and half gags because shampoo powder tasted absolutely awful. 

All discomfort was out the window in the face of the sheer ridiculous embarrassment both of them suffered at each other’s hand, and soon enough, Newt was flapping a hand towards Credence as he picked himself up and Credence turned away, tipping his head into the water to rinse out his hair, a fierce blushing heating his cheeks just the same.

…

The pair of them worked together on the habitat the next day, finishing up the layout and growing the vegetation before securing the expansion charms to complete the environment. As they labored in the nearly completely altered weather system’s sunlight, Newt forwent a shirt entirely. 

It distracted Credence as he hauled buckets of water for the trees and grass, because Newt was...striking.

What other word was there for it? 

Credence couldn't very well avert his eyes the whole day working next to Newt, so there was no earthly way to keep himself from noticing the man now,  loose and relaxed as he worked in the sun.

Similar to his cheeks, his shoulders, arms, back, and chest were all freckled. Where the sun kissed his skin most the spots were darker, larger, and closer together, but on the undersides of his arms and his stomach the pale pinkness of his original skin tone shone through. Then, then that delicate color was slashed through with scars. 

Multitudes of scars. 

Nowhere near the amount of Credence’s own, but the sheer diversity of them, the varying sizes and shapes of them, their wide spread, how they discolored him...Credence found more often than not the cuffs of his trousers and the sleeves of his shirt soaked through with sloshing water because he was so distracted watching Newt. 

He approached again, the yoke of the buckets across his shoulders, to Newt who was crouching down to the rock, coaxing to growth a pad of moss. His trousers rode low on his hips as he knelt in the new grass and Credence noticed a curving pattern to a series of what looked to be puncture wounds dip from Newt’s waist down into his waistband. As he approached he saw that the curve of silvery oval scars repeated in symmetry on Newt’s front and Credence realized what the scar meant.

“Is that a  _ bite _ ?” He asked suddenly without any thought.

Newt merely paused in his task and looked up at Credence, a mild confusion tipping his brows up. “I’m sorry?”

“Ah, uh…” Credence stumbled, aware of his rudeness. Still, he persevered. Newt always tried to encourage his question anyhow. “On your hip? The scar.”

“Oh!” Newt said, recognition pulling his mouth up in a pleased looking smile. “Why yes it is, dragon grabbed me right on the hip, nearly took my whole leg off.”

Credence gingerly sat the buckets down as Newt scrambled up to his feet, eager. 

“Here, look,” Newt announced as he pulled his trousers down off his hips with no prompting, exposing the rest of his flank along with his ass and...pubic region. 

Credence blinked, momentarily struck dumb before he yanked his eyes up from Newt’s hands to his face, but Newt was looking down at his hip and thigh, shifting to the side a bit to show off where the bite wrapped around him, scars from massive teeth left in his asscheek and leg, going in so far at the front as to mar the line of his groin. 

“You can tell by the way the wounds healed what kind of dragon inflicted them. Magically induced wounds often heal strangely, like these tooth marks. From a Peruvian Vipertooth,” Newt explained as he gestured to the scars, twisting a bit to better display their curve.

Credence was nearly sputtering and completely helpless to stop his eyes from looking back down as Newt spoke enthusiastically.

“A lot can be deciphered from the scars. The silvery color indicates the venom of the vipertooth and the width and breadth of each tooth indicates the age. This was from a juvenile as you can see because she only had forty-eight teeth yet. Adult vipertooth dragons have ninety-six. If it were an adult i would also be dead as their venom is far more potent.”

Credence could only nod as he pulled his eyes back up from Newt’s hip and unmentionables to his face which was flushed and happy from the spontaneous opportunity to teach Credence something new. 

And Credence refused to ever be the one to stop Newt once he got started on an anecdote for he loved what the man had to say, but this was certainly the most trying of lessons he had yet to experience. Valiantly, Credence kept his eyes to appropriate places as Newt began to go into depth on Peruvian Vipertooth morphology, but he couldn’t help his wonderment at Newt’s complete lack of diffidence towards decorum. The man was trying to instruct him on the appearance differentiates within the species and behavioral habits of dragons with his trousers around his knees for go-magic’s sake!

Needless to say, once Newt got it in his head to fish out his photographs, Credence sighed with relief because the madman had to hitch his trousers back up his hips to run off to the workshed.

…

After that incident, Credence noticed a change.

And it wasn’t at all subtle. Newt was altering his behavior, but for what reason, Credence couldn’t tell. All he knew was that Newt had started acting differently around him, more relaxed and if possible, even more loose and carefree.

And incidents like that first started happening more and more frequently. 

Not the utter absence of all civility, thank magic, but there was a failing of modesty somewhere. Credence couldn’t fathom what influenced it.

They welcomed in the Re’em to their new temporary home in the suitcase to Newt shirtless once again, and they both worked to help the animals familiarize themselves with the enclosure and their care to Newt wearing nothing but his under shirt and rag knickers. 

Newt would forego changing from his sleeping gown in the mornings till after breakfast instead of before, and when he absolutely had to wear a shirt the sleeves were always rolled up to his elbows, showing off his forearms and the marks upon them. 

It baffled Credence this increase in informality, but he couldn’t say it bothered him much.

A couple weeks later, Credence even found himself walking from the shed carrying the grooming brushes with his shirt left unbuttoned. 

He didn’t even notice he forgot his buttons until he was well into brushing out one of the Re’em’s coats, and by then it didn’t matter so he simply shrugged and continued to detangle the golden fleece of the magic oxen, much to the Re’em’s constant delight. They certainly did like to be pampered.

…

It was about a month later, when he and Newt were approaching their destination at the northern border of Alberta that Credence began to suspect why Newt decided to forego common decency. 

He had just finished with his own shower that evening, and Credence found a seat upon the floating bowtruckle knoll to tend to his hair. He wore nothing but his sleep pants, excusing his impudence as he did more frequently these days with the excuse that he did not want to soil his shirt with the hair oil. 

Tending to his hair in this manner was a new routine for him for he never kept it as long as he did now, to where it nearly touched his shoulders, but the shampoo powder left it dry and frizzy, so Newt introduced him to his herbed conditioner to keep it in line. As often as Credence washed it, he was grateful for the oil, so, quietly Credence smoothed it into the teeth of his comb and began to untangle the mess the washing powder left of his hair. 

And it wasn’t very long later when he felt the curious pricks of bowtruckle fingers on his leg. Poppy and Marlow were looking up at him with small beady eyes for a mere moment before they climbed his pant leg and attempted to proceed up his stomach. 

Credence paused in his combing to scoop the two more adventurous bowtruckles up and bring them to eye level. “Can I help you?” 

Poppy gestured to Credence’s wet and tangled hair while Marlow just kept staring, glancing down every so often. Credence couldn’t help his small smile. “I’m tending to my leaves, would you like me to tend to yours, too?” He asked them. 

They both nodded, Poppy grinning a wide barky smile as he held up his spindly little arms. “Alright, one at a time then,” Credence muttered quietly, picking Marlow up and depositing her on his shoulder before setting Poppy back down in his lap. 

He smoothed some of the hair oil onto his fingertips and gently began to rub it into Poppy’s leaves, polishing the waxy surface till it shined in the evening light and Poppy was lifting his arms again to demand attention elsewhere. Credence kept smiling as he coated Poppy’s thin arms and body with the oil and then smoothing it into his skin till the bowtruckle was glossy and bright.

As he finished up, the bowtruckle reached forwards and caught Credence’s fingers in his hands, stilling him. The small thing was surprisingly strong as he twisted Credence’s wrist till his palm lay open and his long sharp fingers danced across the scars that deformed his skin. Poppy clucked a small disapproving sound as he poked at the thick unfeeling skin.

“Was I too rough?” Credence asked the bowtruckle.

Poppy just shot a look up at Credence that he couldn’t decipher before climbing into his palm and crawling his way up Credence’s arm to perch on his shoulder. 

Credence only huffed a slightly confused sigh as he reached up to get ahold of Marlow next. She came willingly and made herself comfortable in Credence’s lap, but she too stopped his hand before he could start tending to her leaves. Marlow opened his palm as well and rubbed into the ridges of the scars there, where oil glistened. 

“My scars?” Credence asked as she examined his hand more closely chirruping and trilling. Poppy answered her from his shoulder sounding in his tiny voice something Credence couldn’t fathom. 

“I’m sorry if the skin is too callous, I didn’t hurt you did I?” He tried again. 

“They don’t like them,” Newt said from just out of Credence’s line of sight.

His voice made Credence jump in surprise, twitching his head to the side to find Newt coming around the cold frames, wiping his hands clean with a rag.

“The scars,” Newt clarified when Credence only gaped at him. “Bowtruckles don’t like scars.”

“Why not?” Credence asked.

“They’re protective creatures, devoting their lives to defending their homes. People resemble trees a little, with our limbs branching out, our skin the color of bark, and their trees are wand-wood trees, so limbs are sawed off regardless of their protests; leaving holes, knots...broken branches. An old wand-wood tree is nothing but a story of scars and a bowtruckle’s failure to protect.,” Newt explained in a subdued voice as he approached. 

Soon he was close enough to reach out a hand for Poppy to hop onto. “You look divine Poppy, Credence is good at grooming, hm?”

Credence didn’t know what to say to Newt’s words. He looked down at Marlow picking at his palm and couldn’t form a reply. He turned his hand after a moment though, forcing himself to begin rubbing oil into Marlow’s leaves. 

Newt stayed a quiet presence at his side as he inspected Poppy who preened under the attention. 

“I’m not a failure,” Credence spat out a bit later, more acid in his voice than he intended.

“Far from it,” Newt replied, placing Poppy back onto his branch. 

“I’m not broken or...or missing any limbs.”

“No?” Newt questioned.

And the thought of it quieted Credence once more. He applied oil to Marlow’s skin delicately though he felt nothing of the sort within himself. He felt jagged and sharp. Angry. A simmering, below the surface storm. 

Was he broken? Missing a part of himself? Was that what Ma stole from him when she gifted him with the permanent reminders of his transgressions? Was this why he felt so angry all the time? 

“What purpose is there if I am?” He argued, his fingers stopping in their ministrations, Marlow looking up at him. 

“I don’t know,” Newt said back. “None I suppose.”

“None…”

“Does there need to be a purpose?” 

“Of course there does-what…” Credence snapped back, blinking heat and blackness from his eyes. “There has to be, right?”

“I don’t think so…” Newt replied as he climbed up onto the grass beside Credence, letting his legs dangle over the edge. He reached out and Credence let Marlow be shuffled over to Newt’s lap.

“What’s…” Credence tried, his voice thick. “What’s the point if there is no purpose?” 

“You’re asking the same question,” Newt replied softly, shifting against Credence’s shoulder to deposit Marlow back in the tree. 

Credence ground his teeth together, his hands balling up into tight fists in his lap.

“There is no point and purpose because Mary Lou Barebone had no good magic-damned reason to do what she did to you. There is no sense in her actions and there never will be, she was an evil person inflicting evil upon others and nothing in this world can ever justify it,” Newt retorted, a hardness in his voice Credence never heard before. 

His words ripped at the serrated edges of Credence’s anger. Newt said things he knew, logically, were true. They were true facts of his Ma.

“And yet,” Credence choked out, his throat constricting. “And yet, I’m reminded every waking moment of that evil-”

“Credence-”

“Every second of every day I feel her like a demon upon me!” Credence yelled suddenly. He rocked forwards, curled over himself, fury licking into his gut, turning his muscles to stone, they felt so tense.

Newt placed a warm palm upon his bare shoulder, and Credence couldn’t take it. He couldn’t submit to that care. 

He shrugged Newt off of him forcibly and pushed himself from the bowtruckle hill to his feet, staggering forwards unsteadily and spinning around to face Newt who still had his hand outstretched. 

“I feel her! Her oppressive weight, her fingers like knives into my skin. Every time I turn, my back pulls. Every time I write, or work, or touch I miss the feeling in my hands. Every  _ fucking _ step I take I feel what she  _ did to me.  _ And I remember why. I remember why-” Credence shouted, not caring for his volume, for the way his voice tore from his stinging throat. His breath came in harsh blistering waves as his chest heaved to engulf it, to pull and release his sudden encompassing violence.

“I remember  _ why she did it _ , why I suffered, the things I did to deserve it. To deserve the belt and lash and paddle. And they were justified.” The embers within him blazed to outraged fire.

“It was senseless, Newt, but it  _ makes sense to me _ -” 

He focused on Newt then, glaring at him, feeling brittle and too thin as his shoulders trembled with all of his ill kept emotion. Newt’s eyes were bright, the green of them a liquid in rimming red. Tears were on his lashes as he held his breath, holding perfectly still. 

The sight of him so warily controlled, so inanimate, forced Credence to a halt, biting his tongue. 

And that was when he finally noticed himself, felt his body vibrating with the brutality of his fracturing reason, on the very knife’s edge of unleashed destruction.

Black dust wafted from his shoulders in a mockery of serenity, his hands dipped dark with shadow and sand-like particles sloughed from his skin, lifting in delicate swirls. He felt the tickle of his hair shifting in a non-existent breeze against his ears and forehead as it too tried to disappear into obscurial smoke, and though he couldn’t see it, by the way Newt stared at him, he knew his eyes went milky white. 

“Fuck,” was all Credence could choke out. 

The bowtruckles were all hiding in the roots of their tree, and not a single animal sound could be heard throughout the case.

The fear was a humid oppressive mist, heavy in the air. 

Fear of him.

“ _ Fuck _ ,” Credence said again, taking a stumbling step back. “I’m sorry-” 

The realization of it, of the base reaction the entirety of the suitcase’s inhabitants had to him, left him cold as all fury and fire and blazing burning anger drained from his bones, stealing all of the potential that might have spurred him further, leaving him with nothing but the sudden horror of what he was so very close to decimating.

“ _ Credence _ ,” Newt gasped, seeming to jolt back to life.

“I’m sorry, I’m so-”

“Oh Credence.”

Before Credence could even consider another proper thought, Newt launched himself from the bowtruckle knoll and pulled Credence against him, firmly wrapping his arms around him. 

It stunned him for a moment, catching the force of the man, having to brace awkwardly to not fall, but after a few seconds he settled and Newt still did not let him go. He clung to him, pressing his face into Credence’s shoulder, breathing heavily. 

“L-let me go-” Credence said, the brittleness of him coming dangerously close to shattering.

“No, no I won’t-” Newt broke off to huff another breath, hugging him close.

Was he...crying?

“Please let me go I’m, I’m-” Credence begged, feeling a different sort of desperation claw at him, poke at the fragile edges of his last dregs of control. 

“No, I refuse-  _ Credence _ ,” Newt plead and gripped onto him tighter when Credence tried to wriggle free. 

But that only resulted in Credence overbalancing the pair of them and they both crashed to the deck. 

Credence managed to brace himself as they landed so as not to smother Newt, but it apparently gave the man better leverage to wrap his legs around Credence’s to free up his hands and press warm palms into the sides of Credence’s face, directing his eyes down to him.  

“I’m so sorry, Credence I should have never said that. You aren’t broken, You’re not. There’s nothing missing,” Newt rushed out, completely disregarding their tumble to the ground. He sounded desperate for his words and Credence could only stare as Newt babbled on, holding his head firmly and focusing the entire force of his attention on him. 

“You didn’t deserve it. Never, never- no one deserves that,” he practically sobbed, “and you least of all. You aren’t broken, She was a demon and none of it was justified, Credence- Oh Credence please believe me, You’re perfect, I’m  _ so sorry _ -” 

And that was what did it.

Newt red faced and so utterly, desperately, sad staring up at him earnest and sincere. 

That was the blow that buckled every last grasping bid for composure within him.

He watched as a patter of liquid fell onto Newt’s cheeks, mixing into the tears that smeared them wet already. He blinked, clearing his blurring vision to see more water fall, but this time he felt it too, felt his own tears well up in his eyes and drop to splash against Newt’s freckles.

And Credence fought in a shuddering gulp of air. 

Then another, his ribs trembling with the effort.

And another as the shudder turned into a tremor. 

Newt’s eyes swam in his vision, his mouth was pulled into a wobbly grimace, and Credence couldn’t keep the tightness in his chest from knotting up any longer.

A sob crashed through him as he tried to inhale more air into too painful lungs. He was concentrating too hard on breathing, suddenly gasping too fast for not enough breath when a hand threaded into his hair and another smoothed down his neck and over his arm to wrap around his back.

“I’ve got you, I’ve got you, come here,” Newt husked out, drawing Credence down as he fought his tears, easing him to lay against Newt, letting his elbows buckle and catching him as he fell.

“Shhh, you’re alright, we’re alright-”

And Credence lost all semblance of control. 

He collapsed into Newt, letting him take his weight, shift his body against him, press him into his side to where he laid half on top of him as an immense heartache gouged it’s creeping poison through him. 

Newt’s hand was hot on his bare back, starting a slow caress up and down the knobs of his spine over the ropy scars that crisscrossed his skin, his other holding Credence’s head firmly against his neck. Newt continued to speak, his voice low and rumbling through himself into Credence, but Credence couldn’t stop the huge gulping, hitching near wails of his tears as they ripped through him. Fractious animal sounds tearing from his throat as he tried to muffle himself against Newt’s collar. 

His efforts were to no effect however, because hiding his face stopped up his breath which only forced his tears harder, and everything was absolutely irredeemable and hopeless.

_ He _ was absolutely irredeemable and hopeless, and yet Newt still held him close, rubbed at his back and murmured soft reassurances into his hair and never once loosened his grip or made to move away even as Credence bawled himself unconscious, twisting his fingers into Newt’s shirt so hard it tore. 

…

…

Waking up was disorienting.

Because first of all, his eyes felt hot and swollen and opening them was almost the last thing he wanted to do, but Credence forced them anyways because he knew instantly that he was not where he remembered. 

He was in a bed.

But not his own bed.

Credence was laid out flat on his back in a bed very similar to his own, save for the warm weight of Newt half on top of him, his arm flung over his stomach and his leg twisted between his. He was still in just his night pants but the sheet was pulled up over them both and Newt snuffled his cheek into the dip of Credence’s shoulder.

The moment stilled him and aided in his waking. Having Newt against him put a gentle edge on the seeping numbness that his memories created.

They played through his mind again without his permission, creating a horrifying rendition of yesterday evening. He nearly lost everything, destroyed it as that poisonous anger consumed him. 

It prickled hot tears back to his eyes, but Credence blinked them away, concentrating on his slow sleep soft breathing, on remaining loose and relaxed. The result was a silent stream of tears dripping into his hair as he stared up at the high silk lined ceiling of the suitcase workshed. 

He cried, but he didn’t feel sad persay. Or angry either, so this was a vast improvement to Credence’s mind. What he did feel was distant, as if he wasn’t the same person who inhabited his body last night. Truthfully he didn’t want to be. He didn’t want to feel like that, not ever again. He didn’t want to harm Newt or his creatures or his suitcase, he didn’t want to even be capable of the act.

But he was.

And he had destroyed in the past.

He knew he would do it again in the future.

The reminder of it, of the inevitability, stopped up his throat. His breath hitched.

Newt’s hand hugged into his side in response and the man squirmed against him, pulling himself in tighter, wrapping his knee in between Credence’s thighs more firmly. 

Credence tried to still himself to not wake Newt further. 

“Crednss?” Newt asked instead, his voice low and half slurred as he rubbed his cheek against Credence’s skin before picking his head up slightly. 

Newt met his eyes then, and frowned deeply at the sight of him. 

Credence tipped his head on the pillow away from Newt in a half hearted attempt to hide his wet eyes. 

After a moment, he felt the weight of Newt’s cheek lift from his shoulder completely and felt him shift up a little bit. The pillow dipped with what Credence guessed to be Newt’s elbow and his hand that was wrapped around Credence’s waist trailed up and carded fingers into his hair. 

They tangled into the curls of it and Credence heard Newt tsk as he had to backtrack and try again. It made him blink repeatedly as his body warred with silent crying and silent laughter, but when Newt’s fingers tangled again laughter eventually won and a smile pulled at his lips.

“There we go,” Newt whispered and gently tilted Credence’s head back to face him. 

Credence let him and quietly stared at the grinning man who looked down at him, his chin propped up on a fist. “You never finished with your hair last night.”

“I’m sorry…” 

“That you left your hair half done?” Newt asked lightly, combing his fingers against his scalp. 

“You know why,” Credence muttered, his gaze falling away.

“I don’t really.”

“Of course you do,” Credence grumped, shifting uncomfortably. “I nearly murdered everyone over some meaningless words-”

“You nearly reacted in a logical progression of self defense to the unwanted reminder and provocation of past trauma and horrifying remembered adversity.”

Credence stared blankly at Newt, disbelieving. 

“Credence,” Newt said, pulling at his hair a little to keep him from trying to turn his head away. “Credence, i’m not angry with you.”

“You should be,” he mumbled.

“But I’m not. This incident was a long time coming, and more will happen, but I went too far and for that I’m sorry.”

“I almost killed you,” Credence tried to argue.

“But you didn’t. You were nowhere close.”

“How can you tell me that, how do you know that. You have no idea how close I was-”

“You’ve been with me for over a half of a year and this is the first time i’ve seen even a glimpse of the obscurus. You’re control has been impeccable. By all reason the shed should have been demolished a number of times by now at the very  _ least _ ,” Newt explained, then added, “last night should have happened months ago.” 

“Last night should have never happened at all.”

“I beg to the contrary. The obscurus, your magic, it needs to be courted to be controlled and we have let it stay isolated.”

Credence didn’t know what to say to that. He let his eyes fall away as Newt continued to tease fingers through his hair. The obscurus, to him, was pure hatred and anger. He already indulged it in fits and starts when he performed magic, but he feared giving it more of himself. Letting it have more of him felt like giving away who he was and…

“Let me finish your hair for you,” Newt said suddenly, derailing Credence’s thoughts. “It will turn into a nest if we leave it like this, though the doxies might enjoy it.” 

Credence could only nod before Newt untangled himself from the position they slept in and sat up. Without further ado, Newt grabbed him at the shoulders and hauled him upright to sit in front of him, then arranged the blankets in his lap as he settled behind Credence.

“Accio,” He called out, holding his hand open and a moment later the oil bottle and comb sailed into the workshed to his call. Credence noted as he sat up straighter for Newt to better reach his hair, that it was odd, this situation. 

Never before had they slept together, and never before had Newt been so free and generous with his touch. He was in his nightgown behind Credence, and certainly nothing else for he always wore as little to sleep in as he pleased. His knobby knees flanked Credence’s hips, his shins pressing against his ass, and Credence suddenly realized how bare he was, too. 

He was still in just his trousers, his entire torso exposed. Newt was behind him, only just starting to pick the comb into the knots of his hair and he had a full uninhibited view of Credence’s back. The morning light streaming in through the windows and doorway and the candles that provided light would hide nothing of his scars. 

Credence hunched forwards.

What point was there to hide them, though? Last night Newt saw them, felt them, rubbed his fingers and knuckles over them as he soothed Credence. And in the weeks and days prior, Credence had taken more and more liberties with this nudity, following Newt’s example of foregoing his restricting shirts and waistcoats for ease of movement while working. 

Newt had seen his scars many times by now, never once commenting on them. 

But he had never been so close to them as he was last night and in this moment, had never touched them, not with intent.  Not like now. 

“Credence?” Newt asked.

Credence shook his head, squeezing his eyes shut, balling his fists up in his lap. 

“Credence, what’s wrong?” he tried again, but this time he placed a palm on Credence’s back.

A palm that Credence couldn’t help but wince away from. 

“Sorry,” Credence muttered, then tried to force himself to sit up straight again. “It’s nothing, I’m sorry.”

It didn’t work.

A moment later, he felt Newt’s hand on his back again, and though he tensed up and shifted, the hand didn’t retreat. Newt pressed his fingers in till his palm pressed flat and then slid it slowly up his spine, smoothing over the seam of each scar as it went. Soon, his fingers curled around the back of Credence’s neck and his thumb rubbed up into his hair.

“They’re nothing to be ashamed of,” Newt said softly, edging around to the side, “the scars.”

The words struck something within him. They sounded like pity, and Credence, though he had taken advantage of Newt’s pity on many occasions, could not stand for it now. 

Not for this.

Not for her.

“I’m not ashamed of them,” he grit out through clenched teeth.

“Then what is it?”

“I  _ hate them _ ,” Credence breathed harshly. “I hate the feel of them, the memory of them, of her. I hate how they look, what they did to me. I hate you seeing them and I hate you touching them.”

A fraction of the anger from last night licked back to life and Credence panted through it’s knifepoint as his words punched out of him without mercy.  “They pull on my back when I move, tighten as i walk, I can’t feel with half of my hands and every time I inhale i’m reminded that they will never go away. I hate how much time i’ve lost to them. I hate the way you look at me when you see them, and I hate your pity, I don’t want it.  _ I don’t want them _ .”

“Oh.  _ Oh _ -” Newt gasped. 

His hand slid from Credence’s neck to his shoulder and gripped firmly as Newt leaned forwards to half face Credence. “ _ Is that it _ ?”

Credence’s mouth fell open at the utter flippancy.

“No, no wait, I mean- I can fix that.”

“You... _ What _ ?”

“A potion! There’s a potion recipe for scar removal. I should have thought of it sooner,” Newt proclaimed, beaming brightly.

“But...but if there is, why do you have so many scars?” Credence’s incredulity ran deep.

“Because all the ones I have left are because they were inflicted with magic of course. Any normal wound is healed easily enough. Yours are all normal, I’m sure the potion will erase them beautifully.”

Credence stared at him for a moment before he breathlessly asked, “Really?”

“Yes! Give me a few days to get the ingredients and brew it.”

And Credence nodded, flooded with an entirely different sort of numbness.

…

It was a few days of the calmest anticipation of Credence’s life. 

He took to wearing his shirt again while he waited for Newt, feeling a resurgence of discomfort from all of the attention focused on him previously.

He watched as Newt eyed him between errands and pouring over his books, how his face was a calm mask with poorly concealed sadness and strange hope just under the surface. And it was this that finally clued him in on why Newt had been acting differently the past month or so.

Newt had been trying to comfort Credence in a way.

So Credence decided to address it on the third day of waiting, when Newt came to him after dinner.

Credence was washing up the dishes at the spring, his sleeves rolled high as he knelt on the rocks when a gentle knocking on the springhouse alerted him to Newt standing over him. 

“The potion is ready,” He said simply looking down at Credence. 

Shifting to one knee to look up at him, Credence saw how both his shirt and waistcoat hung from his shoulders unbuttoned, only staying on by virtue of the suspenders holding his pants up.

He stood, drying his hands as he did and Newt turned to go back to the shed as Credence spoke. “This is why you’ve been exposing yourself?” It wasn’t much of a question. 

Newt paused in his step and Credence watched his shoulders fall but the man kept walking once he heard Credence dutifully following him. “I’m sorry?” he asked.

“You are constantly half dressed, don’t think I haven’t noticed. It’s because of me isn’t it.” Credence pressed as he followed Newt up the three steps and into the room.

“Yes and no,” Newt said as he drifted over to the copper cauldron sitting on the hearth by the fire, keeping warm. “Truth be told, before you joined me I wore much less clothing within the suitcase and even outside, I was travelling in ah….’uncivilized’ locales before New York, where clothing wasn’t a societal requirement. And well…” Newt trailed off as he hefted the cauldron up from the stones and carried it to a stool resting by the head of his bed. 

“Well?” Credence asked as he followed Newt to the bed, his fingers playing with the lower buttons of his shirt.

“Well, I got back into the habit of it once I came west, and then you…” Newt kept his eyes down, stirring the potion with a careful motion of his wand. “You were so closed off...hunched over and...and sad. And I didn’t know how to help for a while, but then,” He mumbled, and Credence wondered if his cheeks were coloring or if the dim light of the room was tricking him.

“When I came home that day and you were hefting shovelfulls of rock with no shirt on. You were burning in the sun, sweating and dirty, and standing up straight without a conscious decision for it. And- and I saw your back clearly for the first time in the light, and all of them, all of them cutting into your skin...but the work distracted you and I knew, well...Well if i could distract you like that more often then maybe you would stand straighter and not be ashamed of what was done to you and-”

“I told you I’m not ashamed.”

“Yes, I’ve amended my observations,” Newt said and smiled as he looked up. He gestured to the bed and Credence took the cue to sit on it’s edge beside the cauldron and in front of Newt. 

“But now that I have, and now that I know better, we can fix it. Finally heal something properly, yes?”

“Mmm,” Credence hummed softly as he looked at the clear gel of the potion that solidified in the cauldron. 

“Let’s start with your hands, I suspect they have the deepest scarring, from what you’ve said?” Newt spoke as he slid another stool over with wordless magic to take a seat. 

He wasted no time in scooping up some of the potion from the cauldron with three fingers and then held his hand out to wait for Credence.

Who eyed it for a moment, how it looked just like petroleum jelly, completely innocuous, then held his left hand up for Newt. He was unable to completely let go of his wariness despite trusting Newt well enough so he couldn’t help how he tensed when Newt gently took hold of his hand with his clean one and held it palm up. 

“Now, it should heat up as it works and seeps into the callouses of the scars to remove them,” Newt instructed as he smeared the paste-like potion across his skin. 

Credence just watched his palm, feeling his skin start to warm under it’s magic but he could discern no immediate change.

“Give it a minute, here, rub it into your hands,” Newt said and reached for Credence’s right hand. 

He let him have it and glob some more of the potion in his palms then press both of Credence’s hands together. He took up the task thoughtlessly, rubbing his hands together and smoothing the potion across his skin, feeling the heat of it as he spread it across his battered knuckles and up his wrists himself, pausing a moment when Newt dabbed more potion jelly onto his forearm for him to rub in. 

The heat intensified to where it started to feel like that cold sensation one felt when they put their hands under too hot water on Credence’s palms and he gasped a little, pulling his hands apart and holding them out palm up. It grew hotter up his arms too but not nearly so intense and with his fingers beginning to tremble Newt took up his hands in both of his, holding them out and curling his thumbs over to rub into the scars there that mucked up his skin. 

“There we go,” Newt murmured as he watched Credence’s hands closely, massaging his thumbs in. “Can you feel it? My thumbs? Can you feel again?”

“O-oh-” Credence gasped once more and stared intently. He could, he could feel Newt’s thumbs across his skin, pressing in, smoothing through the slick potion across...across soft pliant skin. Across his palms where he pressed into the meat of his thumb and into the dip in the middle, where he traced over the lines and wrinkles that should be there, the ones that marred the skin only from age and use. 

Newt was kneading his thumbs into new skin and Credence found himself blinking hard, forcing down yet more tears as he marvelled at his hands. 

His hands.

Free of abuse. Feeling once again as they should be, after years of limitation, a lifetime of it really. No rough patches of thick gnarled skin that stiffened up his movements and numbed the sensation. Smooth, thin, and beautiful skin. His fingers definitely trembled now, held in Newt’s.

“See? How does that feel,” Newt asked. He let go of Credence to cast a quiet Tergeo on their hands to clean the potion off and Credence held them up to his eyes to examine them closely.

They were...Credence was speechless. They were perfect. He flexed his fingers and clenched his fists and did it again, lowering his hands and then twisting his fingers together, smoothing them across each other and over his palms, pressing in and feeling how he could discern each touch, even recognize the rasp of his fingerprints across the lines of his palms 

“It’s…” Credence croaked, his throat feeling tight. He couldn’t finish his words.

“Yeah,” Newt said and paused a moment longer before piping back up with a cheery, “It worked on my hands too a bit, see? Less freckles. I think they look strange now,” He laughed quietly holding his hands out for Credence to see. “But we have much more to do, where shall we start?” 

“Back...uhm...my back, please,” Credence answered and unbuttoned his shirt in a daze, watching his hands as he did so, finally noticing the marks up his forearms had disappeared as well. Sometimes Ma’s belt was viciously imprecise. Credence was glad to never have to see the stripes of it’s cruelty ever again. 

“Alright, lie down then.”

Setting his shirt aside, Credence obeyed and laid on his stomach, folding his arms up under him to rest his chin on the backs of his hands. He rubbed the rough shaved skin of his chin across the smoothed skin of his hands and smiled.

Newt stood beside him and soon Credence felt the warmth of the potion on Newt’s fingers smear first up at the back of his neck and across his shoulders. He couldn’t help but tense under the touch, all too aware of his body on display, but Newt’s fingers pressed into the knots of his muscles at his shoulder blades and dug almost harshly into the rigidity Credence set himself in. 

“Relax a little or you’ll tired yourself out. Let the potion do it’s work,” Newt quietly chided and worked his fingers slowly down Credence’s back. He first smeared more potion onto his skin, then spread it with his fingers and then smoothed it across his skin with palms, repeating the process for every fresh expanse of scarring as necessary. 

His touch danced down the back of Credence’s arms and then around the curve of his ribs and down to the softness of his belly touching upon the sensitive sides, following the long jaggedly healed lines of his old injuries. Here too, Ma was careless in her aim, striking to punish most. 

The glowing warmth of the potion did half of Newt’s work for him in loosening Credence’s muscles as it dug soothing fingers down into him, working it’s magic at the poorly healed lacerations. The ones on his back didn’t numb him like the ones on his hands did, but they ached more, especially when the weather turned would Credence feel the lines of them twinge into his muscles and against his bones, making themselves more present in his consciousness as he moved and his back pulled at the hard lines of them. 

But no longer.

The thought drew his eyes closed and finally, finally Credence relaxed into the massage of Newt’s hands, the heat settling him down as Newt worked lower and lower down his spine, reaching past the most concentrated mass of damage just below his shoulders to the reaching strikes that crept down his lower back. 

Even as he breathed deeply, tipping his head to the side to rest his cheek on his hands instead did Credence feel the potion pluck away the roughened old wounds. His inhales no longer strained his skin, pushing his ribs awkwardly against the lines of scars, and he shifted his shoulders a bit to really recognize the limber slide of his healed skin across his bones. 

It forced a pleased sigh from him as Newt worked, and Credence shifted and wiggled into the softness of the bed sinking down into a floaty peace. He vaguely wondered about this situation, how at ease he had become with another person’s hands upon him, rubbing and massaging and touching him at their leisure. He’d never allowed this before, never had the opportunity to really, but the thoughts fled with his consciousness.

However long later, Credence half roused from that drifting half sleep state when Newt settled a warm palm flatly against the small of his back.

“Credence?” He asked, calm.

“Mmm?” Credence groaned in question, not bothering to lift his head or open his eyes, feeling pleasantly dozy. 

“Remove your trousers?” Newt coaxed and rubbed his thumb back and forth across Credence’s spine. 

Credence could hear the tentative request for permission in Newt’s voice and he knew he should feel more...reserved about the necessary action, but the heat of the potion soothing him and the desire to finally be rid of this curse dulled his concern. 

Begrudgingly, Credence nodded before pushing himself onto his hands and knees, regretting a little that he agreed to move. He rose up to a kneel to undo the buttons of his trousers and as he worked with clumsy fingers in a half daze Credence grew distracted by the noticeable difference of the atmosphere. 

Everything seemed...closer.

The workshed and the nook in which Newt’s bed was situated was not a big space to begin with, but now, now everything seemed...cozy. Intimate. Warm and comfortable, like the pair of them were in a protected den where nothing could harm them.

Maybe it couldn’t? They were still in the suitcase. 

The idea of it softened something in him.

“Credence?” Newt asked, and Credence realized his fingers stilled on his buttons. He looked up at Newt then, whose head was tilted to the side a curious expression tipping his brows up in mild worry. “Are you alright?”

“Yes,” Credence whispered, his voice momentarily deserting him. He cleared his throat and tried again. “Yes, I’m ok, just...just happy.”

And Newt smiled. A content smile that crinkled at his eyes that met Credence’s for a precious moment before they skittered away and back down to the cauldron and Newt’s hands glistening with potion. 

“Good, good,” Newt said. “Come on then, let’s keep going.”

Credence nodded and finally worked the last button free, pulling his trousers and underthings down his thighs to his knees before he laid back down and shuffled himself the rest of the way out of his clothes. 

He resumed his previous position with his arms under his head, only now he was completely bare, laid out for Newt’s attention. 

It was...strange. 

That pacifying atmosphere still hung over them but now something else wormed into it. Something anticipatory. Something a bit forbidden. 

Something that made Credence flinch when fingers touched at the small of his back once more. He felt very present now, very aware of himself and Newt’s proximity when he pressed his palm down on Credence’s spine firmly and held it there until Credence settled once again. He appreciated the gesture, the silent pause and reassurance. 

Though he wondered if he should say something, but Newt’s hand felt too good, the potion felt too good, and what was happening was far too right for Credence to protest and potentially lose it. Lose the atmosphere, the favor, Newt’s presence and closeness and care. 

Credence inhaled deeply and held his breath for a moment, tipping his head to the side to look over his back.

He found Newt. Watching him, one hand pressed to his skin and the other held in a loose fist up near his chest and Credence realized what the pause was for.

Newt was waiting for permission. 

Credence blinked at the realization, and a small smile curled his lips. 

He nodded and exhaled in a gust, letting the tension out with it. His eyes fell closed and Newt pressed his other hand down to Credence’s skin, both palms pressing into his back and then slowly they smoothed down, dragging warm potion as they went. 

Credence had scars here too, on his ass cheeks and the backs of this thighs from spankings long ago. Mary Lou punished him here when he was younger, and graduated to his back when he aged to double digits. These scars were older and less severe, but Credence could feel them nonetheless, where the paddle, ladle, and ruler bit in. Where they healed but stretched uncomfortably as he grew. 

Newt worked the potion into his skin and smoothed down his thighs to the backs of his knees where he was a little ticklish, but Credence remained still, the lethargy of this frozen moment in time keeping him calmed. Newt’s hands felt good on him, massaging the gel into his thighs.

He ran his fingers down the sides of his legs too, around his hips and pelvis where just the ends of the scars licked, down the outsides of his thighs and knees. Credence couldn’t help his sigh. It really did feel good.

Then, Newt’s fingers dipped gently to the insides of his knees and pulled the wetness of the potion up his inner thighs. His hands were halfway up and Credence inhaled deeply, distantly surprised. 

Newt paused.

“I can’t see any scarring up your inner thighs-?” Newt asked, hushed, and drew his hands away before Credence could voice an answer. 

“There’s none,” Credence rasped a moment later, oddly breathless, pulling his legs closed. He twisted a bit, rolling to his side to look down at Newt who was picking at his fingernails as he examined Credence’s calves for more marks.

“Anywhere else then?” He asked next and Credence finally discerned that red had come over Newt’s features. It wasn’t just a play of dim light across his freckles. 

Credence swallowed but didn’t nod or shake his head. 

Newt glanced at him briefly then before turning away to the potion. 

“Alright then, let it sit for a few minutes then you can go wash it off, alright? I’ll just...clean this up. Take your time,” Newt mumbled as he busied himself with cleaning off his hands and grabbing up the cauldron and stools. 

Credence laid back on his front fully and watched Newt move to the sideboard to scrape the leftover potion into a cannister and begin scrubbing out his cauldron. 

He felt like he vaguely missed something in the moment past, but the contentment still soaking into him with the heat of the potion that worked upon his back prevented any deeper thought on the matter. 

Credence relaxed back into the pillows with a quiet yet happy hum. 

…

His shower that night was even more delightful than the first time. Newt didn’t even bother him like normal. 

Credence revelled in the feel of the water on his healed skin, the heat of it on his palms, the beat of it on his back, the sensation of it trickling down his legs, all new and almost overwhelming. 

Even getting into his sleeping clothes left him giddy and hypersensitive. The soft fabric and how it moved on him distracting, then the feeling of his mattress upon his back catching his attention as well.

It took him a good hour to fall asleep, he kept shifting in his sheets, rubbing into the bed and running his blanket through his hands. 

It was amazing. 

Credence was still marvelling the next day, grinning helplessly as he held his teacup at breakfast, enjoying the warmth of it in his fingers. He said as much to Newt who smiled right back as he buttered his toast, ducking his head to his task, his hair flopping over his eyes.

This was why it took him another day to realize things had changed yet again. 

He was running his fingers through the golden coat of a Re’em, marvelling at the softness of their hair that he could finally feel when he looked up and saw Newt, across the deck with Dougal, looking straight at him.

Only, when their eyes met, Newt looked away. 

Credence blinked, mildly surprised. 

Newt had been doing that a lot lately, demuring from Credence’s gaze. This time was so...blatant though. It set Credence’s mind wondering. 

Why did he change tack yet again? Should he just ask him? Like last time? 

And thinking it over, while he stopped making eye contact again, like in the beginning of their relationship, Newt didn’t rescind his offers of touch. He still placed a hand on Credence’s shoulder, still counselled him in the use of his wand by guiding his arm directly, still grabbed his attention with a tap. They still worked closely side by side, shoulders brushing, and they still tripped over each other in the workshed trying to shuffle around in the tight space. So why this change of all things? 

Nothing he could think of came to mind, but he knew the changing factor was himself once again. The Re’em certainly did nothing to warrant the difference, the only thing that…

It was the potion. 

Newt fixing his scars was what changed. 

_ Was _ it because of that? Or was it because now, Credence walked straighter, his shoulders back and neck upright. Now, Credence knew he moved more easily, twisted his spine into work more readily, walked and jogged and jumped with less hesitation. He was putting his hands on everything he could to feel their texture and smiling at the discoveries. He especially liked the feel of fur and feathers and scales upon his skin so he had taken to grooming their charges frequently. 

No one was certainly complaining about his bid for comfort, but it was the only new element in their lives to which Newt would react. Last time it was the displaying of his scars. Now it was the lack of them, wasn’t it?

So Credence decided to observe a bit longer, try and decipher why this sat so ill in his stomach, and his discoveries brought no ease, because Newt  _ was _ avoiding his gaze, though…

Credence felt Newt’s eyes on him when he wasn’t looking, only to be diverted when he tried to catch him in the act. It baffled him that he didn’t know why Newt was doing this, but that he knew he had to be the reason for it. Credence felt himself angling in for Newt’s touch more and more, trying to make up for the seeming lack, but then, even that seemed to drive Newt off.

Frustrated and distantly upset, Credence decided to ask Newt about it the next night. 

…

He came to Newt after his shower the next evening wearing just his sleep pants, smiling at the feel of the water on his skin drying in the warm air and scrubbing his hair with a towel. He held out the bottle of oil and the comb as he stood over Newt who was hunched at his work table over his manuscript.

“Would you do my hair for me?” 

Newt glanced up from his notes to Credence, to his face, but only briefly before his eyes jumped back down to to his papers. Credence frowned when he knew Newt couldn’t see, noting yet another instance where Newt avoided him. Still, he waited patiently for an answer even as the desire to confront him waned with the poor reception.

“Of course, let me just…” Newt mumbled and began to pack up his writing for the night.

Credence inhaled a fortifying breath as he moved over to Newt’s bed to sit down, he crawled onto it and sat at the far edge, twisting to watch Newt, but sure to leave enough room that Newt would have to sit on the bed as well. 

A few minutes later, Newt came over with a candle and set it on one of the bookshelves that surrounded the bed and climbed onto the mattress behind Credence.

“Alright, I’m here,” He said and reached out for the comb and oil that Credence held up for him. 

Credence didn’t say much as he let Newt tend to his hair, relaxing back into the care of it and enjoying the touch of his hands upon him, satisfied that if he merely asked Newt would still oblige him these new wants. A lightness bubbled up in his ribs that he could still have this, and it almost didn’t matter that the memory of his scars still cracked his composure and confidence.

It would be months and years yet, he suspected, before the reminder of them did not leave phantom wounds upon him, but in this moment, this new beginning, Credence thrilled at his own boldness. 

He ran his hands repeatedly over his knees, feeling the wrinkles in his pants and the roughness of the fabric. 

And he must have fallen into a doze because before he knew more, Newt was done combing out the snarls and knots in his curls and had taken to running his fingers through Credence’s hair. 

Over and over, Newt drug his fingers across his scalp, starting at his forehead and curling his fingers up and back. The oil was all thoroughly smoothed through the strands; this touch was no longer necessary. Credence was loath to say anything to risk this moment, but he opened his mouth to speak regardless, for he initiated this moment with a purpose, and getting answers was not forgotten in his pleasure.

“Newt?”

“Hmm?” He sounded, his fingers slowing just a bit. Credence couldn’t help his frown.

“Why have you been avoiding me?” 

Newt’s fingers stilled. 

Damn it.

“Have I?”

“Yes,” Credence whispered, feeling a tightness of alarm twist under his ribs.

But Newt’s fingers resumed their chore and Credence immediately felt some of the tension drop from his shoulders at the silent reassurance. 

“I suppose i’ve been a bit...remiss,” Newt mumbled, shifting a little behind Credence.

He took in a breath and held it and Credence waited for his exhale. It came a moment later, gusted out with more force than he would have guessed. 

“Don’t be ah- upset with me,” Newt tried to explain. He was hesitant with his words, maybe out of nerves, or maybe trying to find the right ones, but his hands kept carding through Credence’s hair so he gave Newt all the time he desired. “I’ve had some...feelings, I suppose you could say, that need reconciling.” 

“Feelings?”

Newt paused again, but instead of stilling his hands completely, he gripped his fingers into Credence’s hair and held his head forward.

“You are, well, even before the application of the potion- I mean...Ah,” Newt huffed a breathy laugh. “You are a very striking person. Beautiful.”

Credence felt his own breath stop in his lungs.

“You’ve always carried yourself with poise, purposeful in your actions with a captivating economy of movement. Especially when you began to raise your head up. Then, well, then after the scars were removed...You seemed delighted, and for the first time i’ve ever seen you seemed...well you seemed to be  _ you _ , um-” 

Newt let his grip go and threaded his fingers back into his hair, stroked across his scalp again, then kept speaking.

“You’ve never inhabited your body so...so fully? And now you move with such grace and contentment. And that...that I could give this to you, lift such a weight and well. It’s been a struggle not to watch you so I apologize for making you uncomfortable, I will work harder to stop.”

“Newt…” Credence mumbled, feeling his head tip forward, nerves starting to curl his spine. The things he said were...Credence was stunned. Beautiful? Him? Surely not, but…

Instead of struggling for his own words, Credence lifted a hand and wrapped his fingers around Newt’s wrist. 

He held it as he twisted around to sit on one hip and better face Newt, to watch him. Slowly, he pulled Newt’s hand towards himself and pressed his palm to his cheek, flattening it to the softness of his skin and the light rasp of his evening stubble. 

Credence held it there, shifted his grip till he cupped the back of Newt’s hand cradling his jaw and nudged his cheek into the warmth of it. He watched Newt for a moment then, how his eyes weren’t on Credence’s but on their hands, how Newt’s lips parted a little stunned, how he licked at them just lightly. 

Credence inhaled a long, slow breath and let his eyes flutter closed. 

Newt wasn’t a liar, he didn’t have any capacity for it, the things he said he believed to be true, and he called Credence beautiful, graceful, striking. His words culminated in one thought for Credence. Coupled with the care and attention Newt devoted to him, to helping him, teaching him, keeping him company and enjoying his companionship. To seeking Credence out for conversation and encouraging him to grow...How he touched Credence, held him when he cried, carried him to bed, easily came when asked and tended to his hair without an ounce of fuss. 

It was obvious when he took a moment to quantify it.

Newt liked him.

Newt liked him in a capacity of more than acquaintances, mentors, or friends. Newt could very well like him as family, could very well like him as more…

Credence felt confident enough in the face of all the evidence to tilt his head into Newt’s palm till it slid across his cheek and over his lips. He pressed Newt’s hand to his mouth, held it there over his lips, and breathed through his nose, feeling the air gust over Newt’s fingers. 

Then, Credence opened his eyes again and found Newt watching him, his eyes finally up and to his, a sort of awed wonder lifting his brows and dropping his mouth open. 

“I am not uncomfortable from you watching me,” Credence spoke from behind Newt’s hand. “I am sad because you stopped.”

“Oh-” Newt breathed.

Credence shifted Newt’s hand back to his cheek and rubbed into it, gripping back on to Newt’s wrist to steady himself as he shifted up onto his knees. He rose up, dragging Newt’s hand with him and was soon looking down on Newt as he knelt before him. 

Newt followed him with his eyes, tipping his head back to watch, a slight moue of confusion creasing his brow. He shifted back just a bit and Credence followed him, placing his other hand on Newt’s shoulder.

Then, with a boldness borne from Newt’s own blunt honesty, Credence leaned down and gently pressed his lips to Newt’s in a short dry kiss.

“Was this the feeling you needed to reconcile?” He asked softly and a bit short of breath, staying close to feel Newt’s shaky inhale cool the air at his bare cheek.

Newt blinked rapidly, leaning back just an inch, his eyes flickering up to Credence’s then down to his lips. He rasped out a choked “Yes, but- how?”

“Because I think i want this too?” Credence replied and finally sat back, giving them each some distance. He let go of Newt’s wrist finally, but found that his hand was caught back up when he settled down. 

Newt smoothed his thumb over the softness of Credence’s palm, his eyes were trained down on it, staring intently. “You’re not sure?”

“No,” Credence said after a moment, watching Newt’s grip tighten on his hand. “But only because I know nothing of this.”

Inhaling, Credence became determined to explain himself. “What I do know is that I like it when you touch me, i like your warmth and your gentle light contact, I like your attention and consideration. I like  _ you _ , and I’d also like it very much if I could sleep here tonight.” 

Newt looked up at him sharply before a tentative smile tugged at his lips. “Is that so?”

Credence nodded.

“Was that your goal all along? You  _ are _ all ready for bed.”

Credence nodded again. “I liked waking up next to you. I’ve never felt so safe…”

And now Newt smiled a full and happy thing. 

It made something in Credence’s chest float and flutter when he said, “I’m glad.”

**Author's Note:**

> Come chat with me on the tumbles. I'm Zinfandelli :D


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